Black Star vs Braces
by monkeybait
Summary: Black Star may not have defeated Mifune or Death the Kid, but there's no way he'll lose to his new braces! Or will he?


**Story by monkeybait, follow-up by monkeybait's sister.**

Black Star was in the kitchen. He was testing his resistance to extremely painful torture by violating the most sacred and ancient rule in the men's unwritten codebook. That's right, everyone: he was cooking bacon with his shirt off.

"I can't bear to watch!" Tsubaki cried, turning away.

"If I can't take this than I'll never be worthy of receiving [insert celestial gift from above here]!" Black Star yelled as the boiling water stung at his flesh.

"Hey guys, what's going on?" Maka asked, coming inside.

"Something smells cool," Soul grumbled, ambling in after her.

"Black Star is breaking men's unwritten codes!" Tsubaki whimpered.

"That's nice. Soul, Chrona and I are going on a friendly picnic." Maka grinned and held up a basket with a checkered blanket on top.

Black Star snorted. "Hmph. How very feminine."

"How so? It's all about stuffing your face with as much food as you can before the ants come. Then you stomp on them in cleats." Soul grinned at how very cool that sounded.

Chrona poked his fingers together. "This 'picnic' thing sounds dangerous…"

"Trust me, it isn't," Maka reassured him.

Black Star pointed his index finger at them. "Soul! Chrona! I challenge you! To do what I am doing! No! I… I triple dog _dare_ you!"

"I can't. I'm not allowed to divulge my gender," Chrona responded, glad he had a legit reason not to do something so entirely ridiculous.

"No way. That's totally uncool," Soul growled, hands stuffed in his new pants pockets.

And then it began to rain. So they had an indoor picnic while they contemplated Soul's new headband.

"There's nothing cool about that in the least!" Black Star yelled (because it's impossible for him to speak normally).

"What? No way, it's totally cool," Soul argued, straightening it back.

"Now that you mention it…" began Maka.

"Not you too!" Soul glared at them. "My headband is _awesome_. You guys are just jealous that you couldn't possibly pull it off." Then the plot finally divulged itself.

"I'm thinking about getting braces!" Black Star announced, standing on top of the table and ruining their food.

"What's the point? Your teeth are fine," Maka said one Maka-chop later.

"Yeah, braces are totally not cool," Soul said with a shake of his head.

"But if I have braces than I can have a grill!" Black Star pointed to his teeth; no one could mentally imagine how awful that would look on the blue-haired meister.

"Do whatever makes you happy," Tsubaki replied weakly, much to everyone's grief; they were counting on her to burst his bubble.

"Alright then! I am now going to race my ego down to the dentist! See you there!" And with that, out he sped. A few seconds later, the resistance wind blew all their food against the wall.

"Why me?!" Tsubaki howled, hands clasped over her face.

"Poor Tsubaki!" Chrona, Maka and Soul comforted, though they didn't help her clean the wall.

* * *

"Hello, dentists! It is me! Black Star!" the entity-to-be announced upon his arrival. "Do you remember me?!"

The dentists and assistants stared at him, not even attempting to mask their terror. Like all Death City's residents, Black Star was required to come once every six months for a check-up. And on each biannual trip, something always went horribly wrong. When he was six, instead of crying like a normal child, or perhaps even biting the unfortunate dentist's hand, Black Star leapt atop the counter and began showing off how great his new strapless shoes were by stepping all over various customers' faces. When he was ten, the time that most children ate an unhealthy amount of candy, Black Star's teeth shone so brightly that the all the employees that saw them went blind for several weeks. And when he was twelve, Black Star could not tear himself away from the mirrors, shouting "Who's the greatest entity of all time?!" at each of them until they shattered "because they could not stand his great voice", and eventually left without a decent check-up.

Yes. The dentists remembered Black Star.

"B-Black Star…" one of the dentists, Dr. Smith, stuttered, looking at a chart on a clipboard. "You're early this time… Your appointment isn't for another two and half months…"

"Well, hello, my commonly-named hygienist!" Black Star cheered, slapping the poor man on the back with a little too much gusto. "Don't worry about me being early! I have always been ahead of my time, have I not?" Black Star chortled heartily; it was every workers' stimulus response to cringe at the noise. "As for why I am here today, though, it is not very a mere check-in! No, I am here to request braces!"

"Braces?" Dr. Smith said, and everyone sighed with relief. "Well, lucky us- _you_, Black Star! Your teeth are nice and straight. You don't need them."

"The color would be black," Black Star fantasized, hopping onto the back of a waiting room couch, "on a nice, silver chain. When I smile, they will pierce the sunlight! When I growl, people will back off in fear of them!"

Dr. Smith figured people would back off in fear of Black Star already, but tried to come up with another reason that the braces were unnecessary.

"They hurt a lot," he added, even though that wasn't entirely true.

"Nonsense!" the spiky-haired boy replied. "If my classmates can take it, I undoubtedly can!"

"They require a lot of attention," he added again, even though it wasn't really that much.

"Are you denying me my braces?" Black Star huffed, peering in from his high spot on the furniture. "It's not like I'm not going to pay for them. I have good money that I intend to use! Black Star is never cheap to his underlings!" A fan of twenties appeared in his muscular fist.

"Right… Of course not…" Dr. Smith put his teeth on edge. There had to be some way to sway him…

"So, come on then! Let's do this! Yahoo!" Black Star sprung down, taking a moment to show off his sextuple-flip before landing. "I'm beyond ready whenever you are!"

"… Oh, very well!" Dr. Smith gave up to everyone's dismay. "I will give you the stupid braces. But only if you promise not to talk the entire time-"

"Maka! Soul! Pink-hair! Have you come to see me get my braces?!" Black Star shouted, waving over to them as they put away their umbrellas.

"It should be interesting," Maka responded, folding her arms.

"It should be cool," Soul said, eating a large bowl of Jell-o that somehow hadn't been destroyed.

"'Pink hair'?" Chrona asked no one in particular.

"Great! But where is Tsubaki? She should be here to witness this epic moment!" Black Star shoved Chrona and Soul aside to look behind them, even though Tsubaki was the tallest.

"Ow. She's at home, scrubbing the floor from the mess you made," Soul answered, rubbing both shoulders simultaneously, one where he'd hit the wall, the other where Black Star had rather forcefully pushed him.

"Poor Tsubaki!" said all the dentists and assistants, but they didn't go to help her either.

Black Star walked jauntily after Dr. Smith into a small room and plunked himself onto the leaning chair.

"This isn't very comfortable," he noted.

"Whatever. Now open up." Dr. Smith held up a plastic separator.

"What does that do?" Black Star questioned, poking it.

"It keeps your mouth open so your face doesn't get tired when I put the braces on and so that it's easier for me to get to your teeth." _And so you'll shut up for the first time in your life_, Dr. Smith thought to himself.

"Black Star doesn't need a bigger mouth!" Maka shouted from the cushy little sofa which can always be found in medical buildings.

"Yeah, is there anything you can do to make it more normal-sized?" Soul said through a mouth of gelatin.

"We're not doing facial surgery today," the slowly cracking dentist almost growled. "I'm putting on braces. Everyone be quiet so I can focus."

Dr. Smith put the separator in Black Star's mouth, where it fit rather comfortably and without any strain whatsoever. In fact, Black Star could still talk rather normally, so they had to cut the bottom out of a plastic Tupperware box and stuffed that in instead.

"Aaagh," Black Star grumbled.

"This should work perfectly." Dr. Smith grinned at the sound of Black Star not gloating. "Now I will begin."

* * *

One hour later, his ADD almost getting the best of him, Black Star had braces.

"Yahoo!" Black Star cheered. "Now I am the ultimate assassin. I can do anything with these! What do you think Maka? Are you jealous?"

"So much," she muttered sarcastically.

"As you should be!" Black Star proceeded in parading around the waiting room whilst singing a theme song he invented off the top of his head (Needless to say, it wasn't very clever.). Then he paid and sped off to go show Tsubaki.

"Let's not have a picnic again…" Chrona mumbled as he, Soul and Maka walked home.

"I'm sorry if it gave you a bad impression," Maka said kindly.

"Let's not have one with, um… Black Star anyway…"

"Good thinking," Maka agreed.

Suddenly, a blue blur rushed past them, causing their umbrellas to flip inside out.

Soul blinked. "What was that?"

"W-What happened to my umbrella?! It's… It's _dead_! I don't know how to deal with this!!"

"Calm down Chrona, it's okay, it's easy to fix! 'Dead'?"

"I think that was Black Star," Soul guessed. "No one else runs that fast. Or has blue hair."

"I bet he's just running around showing people his face," Maka sighed, rolling her eyes. "There, see, Chrona? All fixed. Uh… Chrona?"

"Rain! I don't know how to deal with being wet!" Chrona shrieked, hopping about, Ragnarok pulverizing him during his terrorized rampage. Maka stood there, at a loss of what to do, so she and Soul went home to make some Pillsbury Crescents.

* * *

"Dr. Smith!" cried the ever-obnoxious voice as he exploded into the dentistry. "There is something severely wrong with my braces!"

"What is it- dear God!" Dr. Smith shouted as he looked at Black Star's mouth. The once straight chain was now a completely mangled piece of metal, twisted pieces stabbing him on the cheek. Despite his ridiculous appearance, the meister still looked incredibly disgruntled.

"I demand you take them off and give me back my money!" he bellowed, the windows blowing outward at the velocity of his voice. "And take these things off too! Soul was right! Braces are uncool in all ways!"

"But I just put them on you!" Dr. Smith sobbed. "How could you manage to do _that_ in less than five minutes?"

"Well," Black Star began, his voice sounding much like Daffy Duck, "I went home to celebrate and Tsubaki had made me popcorn, so I tried to see how many pieces I could fit in my mouth and next thing I know, Tsubaki is gasping and my braces are horribly disfigured!"

The dentist shook his head. "I tried to tell you not to have popcorn, but you ran away before I could!"

"These braces aren't what they're cracked up to be," Black Star snapped, completely ignoring him. "You're taking them off for free!"

"… Okay, fine," Dr. Smith caved, "as long as you promise to NEVER COME BACK AGAIN! No matter what the requirements of Shibusen are!"

"No problem. This place sucks anyway," Black Star responded, hands clasped behind his head as per usual.

* * *

"So you ended up getting your braces removed after all?" Maka said the next day at lunch. "How pointless. I hope you learned your lesson: don't buy things just because you want them. They're not always as good as you think they are."

"Hey! How awesome do you think I'd look with Sharingan contacts?" Black Star asked excitedly.

"You weren't listening at all, were you?" Maka sighed.

"Sharingan contacts. That's definitely worth wasting your money on," Soul nodded.

"But Black Star," Tsubaki sputtered, "we're saving our money to buy a new table after you chopped ours in half! Remember?!"

"Table-schmable," Black Star sniffed. "I can have as many tables as I want when I become an almighty god! Sharingan contacts are only once in a lifetime! Come on, Soul!"

The two friends scampered away.

"Why?! Why me?! It simply isn't fair!" Tsubaki moaned, slamming her forehead on the table.

"Poor Tsubaki!" all the students confided, and Maka patted her on the shoulder, but no one offered to stop Black Star.

Thus, another strange, Black Star-related mishap concluded in Death City.

**When I got my braces…. Hrmmm… four years ago, after two months of having them on I really missed popcorn. I had one piece and my brackets broke instantly. True story. Of course I had to have popcorn again afterwards. They never broke again, though.**


End file.
